Need You Dead

88 Friday 29 April

Fifteen minutes after he ended the call from PC DuBois, Roy Grace’s phone rang again. It was Ray Packham.

‘Roy, the serial number on the GoPro in Exton’s car — I’ve just heard back from Christopher Diplock.’

‘Yes?’

Packham had a serious, somewhat analytical voice, devoid of emotion. It could often be hard to read a positive or negative into his tone — as it was now. It sounded like it was going to be a negative answer, but then he surprised him.

‘The serial number on the GoPro — Diplock has confirmed it’s his camera, the one that was stolen from his car during the night.’

Grace thanked him and hung up. Jon Exton. The dark horse on his team? This mild-mannered, diligent detective would have been the last person he could have imagined being a killer. Yet the facts were making more and more sense. He’d split up with his partner, Dawn. She needed to be questioned. Was the reason for their split another woman? Lorna Belling?

Was Exton the secret lover she had told her close friend Kate Harmond about? The man she’d been having an affair with who had told her his name was Greg? Except she had found out, just before she died, that it wasn’t his name at all.

He stared down at his handwritten notes and actions. Jon Exton.

Every major crime was a puzzle with dozens, hundreds and sometimes thousands of pieces that had to be painstakingly pieced together. As was happening now. But there was something that made him hesitate, stopping him from punching the air in joy.

Was it because he had always liked the Detective Sergeant and was now feeling a measure of sympathy for the man and all that he faced? Misplaced sympathy, he knew. He had no time for officers who discredited the force.

But there was something else here. This puzzle, where at first all the pieces seemed to be fitting into place, felt like a box of flat-pack furniture which had been supplied with one crucial part missing. The bit that would hold the whole assembly together.

Nonetheless, with the evidence now in front of him, he had no alternative but to inform Lesley Manning, the Chief Constable. He picked up the phone and called her secretary. But it went to voicemail. Next he tried Manning’s staff officer, a DI called Tess Duffield. The CC was in a meeting, Duffield told him, and asked if there was a message she could pass on. Grace simply asked if she could call him back, urgently, as soon as convenient.

He had to wait less than fifteen minutes.

‘Roy, all OK?’ she asked. She was a calm, smart lady and he liked her.

‘I’m afraid we have a problem, Lesley,’ he said.

‘Something we can talk about over the phone, or do you need to come and see me? I’ve got to leave in five minutes for London — I could meet you after 5 p.m., or is that too late?’

Grace gave her the information over the phone. She listened without interrupting, then was so silent when he had finished, he wondered for a moment if the line had been disconnected. Then she spoke.

‘He’s in hospital, you said?’

‘Yes.’

‘Has DS Exton indicated any awareness that he’s under suspicion?’

‘Not that he’s under suspicion — but I’ve insisted he go to see the force doctor for psychological evaluation. I’m afraid he’s in a bad way — very close to a breakdown if not already in the throes of one.’

‘Do we know where he was going at the time of the accident?’

‘No, I will find out when we interview him — hopefully later today. He was heading towards Hailsham, where his estranged partner, Dawn, lives, maybe to go and see her.’

‘Or harm her?’ Manning said.

‘I think anything is possible in his current state of mind. I did wonder, also, whether he might have been heading towards Eurotunnel.’

‘Do you think he’s a flight risk?’

‘Well, his behaviour is clearly erratic — and he’s panicky. I’ve had a guard put outside his room at the hospital, as a precaution, instructed to not let him leave, but I’ve not given the reason.’

‘But you haven’t arrested him yet?’

‘No, I’m still waiting for what I think could be one more piece of crucial evidence — which I expect to have later today. And I wanted to speak to you first and inform you. I also want to be completely sure we have the right person. If and when we do arrest him there will inevitably be a massive media circus; it won’t look good to arrest one of our own, and it would be even worse if we subsequently released him without charge. I think we need to prepare a media strategy with Comms in advance, to ensure the reputational risk to Sussex Police is minimalized.’

‘Roy, I’d like you to brief ACC Pewe, and also update Professional Standards of the latest situation. Then I think we should all have a meeting after I’m back this afternoon. Are you anticipating any developments by then?’

Thinking about the Super Recognizers, he replied, ‘There may well be.’

Ending the call, he took a deep breath before dialling Pewe, hoping with luck to get his voicemail, and buy himself some time before talking to him. But he was out of luck.

‘Well, I did tell you yesterday to suspend the man,’ Pewe said with undisguised smugness in his voice.

‘With respect, I don’t see how that would have changed anything, sir,’ Grace retorted, struggling to hold his temper.

‘It appears to me, Roy, that there’s rather a lot of things you don’t see. Perhaps you should consider a trip to those opticians, the ones always advertising on television — what are they called — SpecSavers? You’d better come and see me right now — that is, of course, if you can find your way here.’